March 15, 2004

  • a weekend of disappointments...

    i have an addictive personality. i find something i like and i obsess and obsess and delve into its world trying to own it. it happened with video games, books, crosswords, chess, scrabble, weed, and now poker. what's weird, is that certain very addictive things came and went in my life without much ado. cocaine just never stuck. i tried it and i had fun but i didn't drive the eight ball highway. e and psychedelics both had their eras, but out of the drugs only weed held me. alcohol never even had a chance, and i had too much anti indoctrination for cigarettes. but with my slightly obsessive compulsive brain, plus social anxiety, in addition to some slight depression, and a desperate need for escapism (the old usual divorce tugging thing) i clung to the wacky tobacci for way too long. my parents finally kind of had to have an intervention. For WEED, for crying out loud. but i digress...

    POKER. yes, thanks to tv its seems its everywhere these days, and a certain group of friends has now started a weekly game and it has changed my weekly routine. how i do on that silly game can affect me the rest of the seven days. its beutiful. chess is amazing, but at its base the psychology of it is hindered by what is ultimately a numbers game. being able to see all the moves. scrabble has a certain flare and creativity, but once again, just knowing the words plus board theory and you've got it. poker though, knowing all the odds in the world won't make you world class, because its a people game, a game of observation, of taking a small amount of information and coming to correct conclusion, a game of guts, of acting... i have just started my love affair. the only issue, is that this obsession has some side effects: the excitement of gambling. gambling can add a surge of energy and thrill to even the most mundane of activities. we had an oscar pool at the office, and suddenly waching even the categories that no one cares about became fun. but there lies the problem, that excitement can lead to an unstoppable addiction, and to the loss of incredible amounts of money, so like some previous obsessions i must be careful.

    anyways, on this weekends poker game, a few new people came to play, and it was terribly hard to read them, to know if they were being stupid newbie's, or if they actually had the nuts. i kind of fucked up a bit and bet when i should have, trying to force people out of bets that had trips. bet then, on the shortest stack, i was playing very extremely tight, waiting for a good hand, and bam! i get two aces in the pocket, basically the best hand you can be dealt. so i don't bet too high, not wanting to chase people out, but then i got bet against big, and i went all in. he had a pair of kings with a ten kicker, and i was almost unbeatable, but on the river, bam again, a ten comes off, and i am out. oh lady luck, i hate you.

    the second dissapointment was mostly my fault. in november my longest relationship, one of two years dismantled, and while the freedom kept my spirits up at first, now i am just lonely and horny all the time, and reading too much into any interaction with my female friends. so when i friend sent me this flrity email, wanting to hang cause she was comming into the city, i was ready for some hanky panky. needless to say, the vibe for sex did not exist, and i left annoyed and even more desperate for a sexual encounter. oh how the brain can make a simple thing complicated...